THE INSIDER AUTHORITY ON GATOR SPORTS

Fast-starting LSU smacks Gators, 10-6

HOOVER, Ala. — With the regular season championship under their belt, the Florida Gators showed up to the SEC Baseball Tournament with nothing to gain Wednesday night and unfortunately they played like it.

LSU jumped out to a 5-0 lead and cruised to a 10-6 victory over the Gators as the tournament got under way at Regions Park, marking the fifth straight year the No. 8 seed defeated the No. 1 seed on day one of the SEC Tournament.

“I thought they were really flat,” Florida head coach Kevin O’Sullivan said of his team. “We addressed it before we stretched. I understand what we accomplished during the regular season, but this is the second season. We can’t just turn it on and turn it off, and we’ve got to talk about that. We can’t go through the motions, and expect to turn it on next weekend [in NCAA Regionals].”

The Tigers took hold of the momentum in the second inning against Florida starting pitcher Brian Johnson.

LSU designated hitter Matt Gaudet led off with a towering shot over the 405-foot sign in center field. A walk to Leon Landry, a single by Alex Edward and a double steal set things up for Mason Katz, whose single up the middle scored two runs to move the Tigers to a 3-0 lead.

Katz, who got his third start of the season in left field for LSU, was often the player forced to catch the ceremonial first pitch before home games because he wasn’t in the lineup. Wednesday night, he made the Gators pay for his time on the bench went 3-5 with two RBI.

“It was a little change going from catching the first pitch [to starting] because the balls are moving a little move,” Katz quipped. “In the beginning, I kind of [had some nerves] but my teammates settled me down.”

Following Katz’s second inning single, Mikie Mahtook walked and Tyler Hanover loaded the bases with a bunt single. Micah Gibbs grounded into a double play, which made it 4-0 and offered the first sign of relief to the beleaguered Johnson. But Johnson wasn’t out of the woods quite yet. Austin Nola lined a single to center field to drive in Mahtook from third, giving LSU the early 5-0 advantage.

“They came out swinging the bats,” O’Sullivan said. “They put that five spot on us in the second inning. I thought we battled and put some zeros up on the board after that, but they just kept chipping away. They played a better game than we did.”

The Tigers’ pounded out 19 hits on the night, hitting with the kind of confidence that wasn’t evident when the Gators swept the three-game series against LSU earlier this month.

“History can tell us a lot of things,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. “It can give us a lot of hope. In this league, the difference between the best team and the worst team is non-discernable in terms of talent. You can win or lose every game in this league. Even though we were the eight seed and we had been swept by these guys, we honestly felt that we had a good team and could completely favorably with them.”

Johnson lasted only 3-2/3 innings, allowing nine hits and seven runs. He walked three batters and struck out two. He was pulled after 87 pitches to keep his arm fresh for NCAA Regionals next weekend.

When Johnson allowed faced LSU earlier in the month, he allowed only three runs in 6-1/3 innings. Wednesday, he didn’t have command of his curve ball and that allowed the LSU hitters to sit on his fast ball, which they pounded.

“I didn’t do as well as I’d have liked,” Johnson said. “I battled but I just fell behind too many hitters.”

The Gators only real chances to chop into the LSU margin came in the fifth and the eighth innings. The Gators scored two in the seventh. With Tyler Thompson on second after a double, LSU starter Anthony Ranaudo was one pitch away from getting out of the inning, but he hit Nolan Fontana with a two-strike slider. Matt den Dekker extended his hitting streak to 16 games by driving the first pitch of the at-bat over the head of Katz in left field for a two-run double that cut the deficit to 7-3 but Ranaudo got out of the inning by getting Preston Tucker on a called third strike.

In the eighth, den Dekker led off with his 12th homer of the season over the center field wall. One out later, Austin Maddox reached on an infield single. After Johnson flied out to left, Daniel Pigott reached on a four-pitch walk that sent Ranaudo to the showers.

Ranaudo (4-2) lasted a season-high 7-2/3 innings, giving up eight hits and six runs (five earned), while striking out five batters and walking two. His 114 pitches were also a season high. Ranaudo, who came into the game with an 8.49 ERA, had velocity consistenly in the low 90s, even touching 94 mph in the seventh inning. His slider regained the tilt that it lacked when the Gators knocked Ranaudo around for four runs in two innings in Gainesville late April.

After giving way to Paul Bertucci, Josh Adams came through with a run scoring single to left that drove Maddox home and sent Pigott to third. Thompson followed with a run-scoring single but Bertucci got out of the inning when he sneaked a called third strike past Ben McMahan.

Bertucci set the Gators down 1-2-3 in the ninth.

The game definitely belonged to Ranaudo, who came into the season projected as a top-ten overall pick in the June MLB Draft. A stress injury to his right elbow early in the year saw his stock fall and multiple shaky starts after the injury had his stock potentially plummeting out of the first round. His stock is probably on the rebound after Wednesday’s start, which came in front of well over 20 MLB scouts.

“I thought these last two or three weeks, my stuff has been starting to come back to me,” Ranaudo said. “My stuff was good. I didn’t feel like there was any pressure on me, but a start like this is the right direction. Everybody on the team was like, ‘that’s the Anthony we know,’ and that’s a good feeling for me. But it’s also a good feeling for the other guys, because they know I’m back being me.”

O’Sullivan wasn’t surprised to see Ranaudo turn the corner with a quality start. The LSU ace looked like a completely different pitcher from the game last month when he got hit hard in Gainesville.

“He was a totally different pitcher this time around,” O’Sullivan said. “He got the ball down better. He was up in the zone and only pitched with one pitch (the fast ball) last time we saw him. He commanded both sides of the plate, and I thought he pitched inside effectively.”

Thirteen of the 27 outs the LSU pitchers recorded against the Florida hitters came on fly balls. The Gators made consistent hard contact, often just getting under the ball. Regions Park is easily the largest stadium Florida has played in this season, with 340-foot fences down the lines and a 405-foot fence in center field. The big swings from the Gators caused outs, especially against a good defensive outfield for the Tigers.

“With the dimensions of the ballpark, we hit too many fly ball outs,” O’Sullivan said. “We have to get on top of the ball and hit it on the ground to use our speed a little more.”

The LSU lead was big enough early in the game that Florida decided to save some of their better bullpen arms. The bullpen did combine to pitch 5-1/3 innings, allowing ten hits but only three runs.

The loss pushes the Gators into the loser’s bracket of the tournament against the loser of Wednesday night’s Arkansas-Vanderbilt game. The Gators are expected to start lefty Alex Panteliodis (8-2, 3.32). The start time is listed as TBD, but game two of session one started around 1:30 EST Wednesday.

HOOVER, Ala. — With the regular season championship under their belt, the Florida Gators showed up to the SEC Baseball Tournament with nothing to gain Wednesday night and unfortunately they played like it.

LSU jumped out to a 5-0 lead and cruised to a 10-6 victory over the Gators as the tournament got under way at Regions Park, marking the fifth straight year the No. 8 seed defeated the No. 1 seed on day one of the SEC Tournament.

“I thought they were really flat,” Florida head coach Kevin O’Sullivan said of his team. “We addressed it before we stretched. I understand what we accomplished during the regular season, but this is the second season. We can’t just turn it on and turn it off, and we’ve got to talk about that. We can’t go through the motions, and expect to turn it on next weekend [in NCAA Regionals].”

The Tigers took hold of the momentum in the second inning against Florida starting pitcher Brian Johnson.

LSU designated hitter Matt Gaudet led off with a towering shot over the 405-foot sign in center field. A walk to Leon Landry, a single by Alex Edward and a double steal set things up for Mason Katz, whose single up the middle scored two runs to move the Tigers to a 3-0 lead.

Katz, who got his third start of the season in left field for LSU, was often the player forced to catch the ceremonial first pitch before home games because he wasn’t in the lineup. Wednesday night, he made the Gators pay for his time on the bench went 3-5 with two RBI.

“It was a little change going from catching the first pitch [to starting] because the balls are moving a little move,” Katz quipped. “In the beginning, I kind of [had some nerves] but my teammates settled me down.”

Following Katz’s second inning single, Mikie Mahtook walked and Tyler Hanover loaded the bases with a bunt single. Micah Gibbs grounded into a double play, which made it 4-0 and offered the first sign of relief to the beleaguered Johnson. But Johnson wasn’t out of the woods quite yet. Austin Nola lined a single to center field to drive in Mahtook from third, giving LSU the early 5-0 advantage.

“They came out swinging the bats,” O’Sullivan said. “They put that five spot on us in the second inning. I thought we battled and put some zeros up on the board after that, but they just kept chipping away. They played a better game than we did.”

The Tigers’ pounded out 19 hits on the night, hitting with the kind of confidence that wasn’t evident when the Gators swept the three-game series against LSU earlier this month.

“History can tell us a lot of things,” LSU coach Paul Mainieri said. “It can give us a lot of hope. In this league, the difference between the best team and the worst team is non-discernable in terms of talent. You can win or lose every game in this league. Even though we were the eight seed and we had been swept by these guys, we honestly felt that we had a good team and could completely favorably with them.”

Johnson lasted only 3-2/3 innings, allowing nine hits and seven runs. He walked three batters and struck out two. He was pulled after 87 pitches to keep his arm fresh for NCAA Regionals next weekend.

When Johnson allowed faced LSU earlier in the month, he allowed only three runs in 6-1/3 innings. Wednesday, he didn’t have command of his curve ball and that allowed the LSU hitters to sit on his fast ball, which they pounded.

“I didn’t do as well as I’d have liked,” Johnson said. “I battled but I just fell behind too many hitters.”

The Gators only real chances to chop into the LSU margin came in the fifth and the eighth innings. The Gators scored two in the seventh. With Tyler Thompson on second after a double, LSU starter Anthony Ranaudo was one pitch away from getting out of the inning, but he hit Nolan Fontana with a two-strike slider. Matt den Dekker extended his hitting streak to 16 games by driving the first pitch of the at-bat over the head of Katz in left field for a two-run double that cut the deficit to 7-3 but Ranaudo got out of the inning by getting Preston Tucker on a called third strike.

In the eighth, den Dekker led off with his 12th homer of the season over the center field wall. One out later, Austin Maddox reached on an infield single. After Johnson flied out to left, Daniel Pigott reached on a four-pitch walk that sent Ranaudo to the showers.

Ranaudo (4-2) lasted a season-high 7-2/3 innings, giving up eight hits and six runs (five earned), while striking out five batters and walking two. His 114 pitches were also a season high. Ranaudo, who came into the game with an 8.49 ERA, had velocity consistenly in the low 90s, even touching 94 mph in the seventh inning. His slider regained the tilt that it lacked when the Gators knocked Ranaudo around for four runs in two innings in Gainesville late April.

After giving way to Paul Bertucci, Josh Adams came through with a run scoring single to left that drove Maddox home and sent Pigott to third. Thompson followed with a run-scoring single but Bertucci got out of the inning when he sneaked a called third strike past Ben McMahan.

Bertucci set the Gators down 1-2-3 in the ninth.

The game definitely belonged to Ranaudo, who came into the season projected as a top-ten overall pick in the June MLB Draft. A stress injury to his right elbow early in the year saw his stock fall and multiple shaky starts after the injury had his stock potentially plummeting out of the first round. His stock is probably on the rebound after Wednesday’s start, which came in front of well over 20 MLB scouts.

“I thought these last two or three weeks, my stuff has been starting to come back to me,” Ranaudo said. “My stuff was good. I didn’t feel like there was any pressure on me, but a start like this is the right direction. Everybody on the team was like, ‘that’s the Anthony we know,’ and that’s a good feeling for me. But it’s also a good feeling for the other guys, because they know I’m back being me.”

O’Sullivan wasn’t surprised to see Ranaudo turn the corner with a quality start. The LSU ace looked like a completely different pitcher from the game last month when he got hit hard in Gainesville.

“He was a totally different pitcher this time around,” O’Sullivan said. “He got the ball down better. He was up in the zone and only pitched with one pitch (the fast ball) last time we saw him. He commanded both sides of the plate, and I thought he pitched inside effectively.”

Thirteen of the 27 outs the LSU pitchers recorded against the Florida hitters came on fly balls. The Gators made consistent hard contact, often just getting under the ball. Regions Park is easily the largest stadium Florida has played in this season, with 340-foot fences down the lines and a 405-foot fence in center field. The big swings from the Gators caused outs, especially against a good defensive outfield for the Tigers.

“With the dimensions of the ballpark, we hit too many fly ball outs,” O’Sullivan said. “We have to get on top of the ball and hit it on the ground to use our speed a little more.”

The LSU lead was big enough early in the game that Florida decided to save some of their better bullpen arms. The bullpen did combine to pitch 5-1/3 innings, allowing ten hits but only three runs.

The loss pushes the Gators into the loser’s bracket of the tournament against the loser of Wednesday night’s Arkansas-Vanderbilt game. The Gators are expected to start lefty Alex Panteliodis (8-2, 3.32). The start time is listed as TBD, but game two of session one started around 1:30 EST Wednesday.